


The Destruction of the Temple

by Triss_Hawkeye



Series: The Temple [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst and Humor, Background Aziraphale/Crowley, Crowley being a demon and how he feels about that, Dissociation, Doubt, Fluid-presenting Crowley, Gabriel is an encouraging boss even to people he’s not the boss of, Gen, Impaling, Reconciliation, Repeated Discorporation, Theology, Violence, keeping secrets, the unpleasant parts of being physically incarnate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2019-08-13
Packaged: 2020-08-20 11:42:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20227291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Triss_Hawkeye/pseuds/Triss_Hawkeye
Summary: Gabriel needs to talk. In fact, there's been a lot of troubling things on his mind lately. (Not tea. Tea gets a free pass.) Regrettably, he can think of only one other person who might understand.





	The Destruction of the Temple

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write a Crowley & Gabriel follow-up to The Temple of My Celestial Body but wasn’t sure how. I couldn't see it not being a violent encounter at first, and so I ended up leaning into that idea. This fic is somewhat darker than the first story, but perhaps not in the ways you’d expect. Still, mind how you go.

Gabriel needs to talk.

He’d had that conversation with Aziraphale, of course, about clothes and bodies and consuming things, but rather than that relieving the pressure building up inside him, he just feels worse. Maybe it’s because, having seen some of his thoughts about physical existence being spoken and listened to, the rest of his thoughts—the dangerous ones, the ones he is finding harder and harder to ignore—are clamouring to be spoken too. And he hates keeping secrets, he hates holding everything in; he just wants to open his mouth and let every half-formed fragment of an idea spill out so that maybe he can start to actually piece them together. But he can’t do that.

He runs, and pounds his feet against the pavement, and swallows swift mouthfuls of clear water, and thinks about talking.

He can’t talk to Heaven, at any rate. Everyone’s looking to him to hold things together after Armageddon decidedly didn’t happen. They need to see him smiling, they need to see that he’s all right, so that they know that everything’s doing just fine. Sandalphon’s his favourite person to talk to about small things, idle musings about stuff humans do or say. But all this would be too much to put on his shoulders. It wouldn’t be right for Gabriel to spread his doubt and discomfort around, not when what Heaven needs right now is peace and security.

And he can’t talk to Hell. Gabriel’s been reluctantly having bimonthly meetings-cum-shouting sessions with Beelzebub about execution of the Plan going forward, and it’s becoming clear to him that she doesn’t have any more idea than he does of what’s really going on beyond a strange sort of business-as-usual filling up their in-trays. So no, he definitely can’t talk to Hell about it, not when he has to keep up the impression that he’s in on the Plan and she’s not. (She’s obviously trying to do the same to him, though Gabriel’s pretty sure she doesn’t suspect a thing.)

He doesn’t want to talk to Aziraphale about it either. It’s too soon, by the timescale they’d agreed upon so as to keep things under the radar, so to speak. And besides, the thing at the root of what is troubling him concerns Aziraphale himself, concerns—well, anyway. That would just foster bad blood, it wouldn’t work.

So. By a simple process of deduction, that leaves Crowley. A perfect grey area. And a terrible idea. 

Crowley’s been around since the beginning—he’s one of the most notorious devils in Hell’s portfolio, and even more notorious now he’s essentially defected. He was even, for a long time, a dastardly nemesis to Aziraphale himself who, recent complications aside, was always one of Heaven’s most experienced agents in Earth matters. (They don’t seem to be nemeses any more. Gabriel’s still not entirely sure when _that_ happened, but they do seem jointly responsible for whatever went wrong with the End Times. Still, given the whole defection from Hell thing Crowley’s got going on, Gabriel figures it’s not as big of a problem as it could be—that and he secretly enjoys how mad Beelzebub gets about it.) Still. It’s definitely a terrible idea. 

But then, talking to Aziraphale in the first place had also been a terrible idea. And that hadn’t gone so badly, had it?

Anyway, it’s not like Gabriel’s about to go in unprepared. In some ways, a demon (ex-demon?) is the perfect person with whom to discuss doubts and questions without them spreading anywhere they weren’t already present, but he does need to be wary of them being twisted against him. And what with Aziraphale’s unease about Crowley seeing them when they last spoke, it may be best to be on guard. The angel had implied some measure of wrath on Crowley’s part—not that wrath is particularly unexpected for a demon, of course, but nonetheless Gabriel is fully ready to de-escalate a likely confrontation.

And so it is with feet fitted with the readiness of peace that Gabriel finds his chance, spotting Crowley walking by himself down Whitehall one day. He takes a moment to watch the demon move, inefficiently sinuous in black jeans even tighter than the ones he owns. From the other side of the road, Gabriel moves to catch his eye—it’s not particularly busy, the sun is out, and Gabriel is wearing his business jacket (he’s not here on _official_ business, but it’s still business, and besides, this jacket is new and weighty in its softness and hangs very pleasantly from his shoulders). All it takes is a moment to be particularly Present—and Crowley’s head jerks to face him. 

His expression doesn’t change, nor does he give any sign of reacting to the sight of Gabriel beyond one: with a languid flick of his arm, he raises one hand into the air and snaps his fingers. 

It’s hard to figure out what happens in the moment, it’s over so fast. But Gabriel feels a lurch as he is violently ejected from his corporeal body. He has one last perception of the scene imprinted upon his consciousness—the bus screeching to a halt, the surface of the road that had an instant ago been ten feet away, the broken body sprawled out horribly upon it, a small, satisfied nod from Crowley as he doesn’t even break step—and then he is gone.

Well, that could have gone better.

Gabriel reappears in Heaven with the translucent shimmer of the recently discorporated. His form is still human-shaped, like an after-image of his earthly appearance, but dressed in pure white, default manifested clothes. He takes a moment to regret the loss of that nice new jacket, and drifts over to Michael’s office to order a fast-tracked replacement body. Michael tuts sympathetically when he tells her with a rueful laugh about accidentally getting run over by a bus, and hands him the requisite paperwork to fill out. 

The replacement takes three days. He busies himself in Heaven as usual, but it’s been a long while since he was last discorporated. Gabriel feels fuzzy at the edges, or rather that there are no edges any more. It’s like when an arm or a leg goes to sleep, only across his entire form—where there ought to be sensation, even subconsciously so, there’s just… nothing. His recorporation is fast enough that he doesn’t have to live with the strangeness for too long. He slips back into his body—a spare of his usual shape kept on standby, privileges of being an archangel—with the ease and comfort of shrugging on one of his favourite shirts. It closes around him like a well-fitting suit, and he puts a well-fitting suit on over the top for good measure. Rolls his shoulders, stretches out his arms, wiggles his fingers.

“Much better,” he tells Sandalphon by the water cooler. He takes one of the small plastic cups, fills it, and downs its contents in a single fluid gulp. It’s not quite right—it’s not _Earth_ water after all—but it’s close enough and it feels good. Sandalphon watches him with head cocked to one side. “Oh, it’s actually nice, once you get used to it,” Gabriel tells him cheerfully. “Human bodies are made of it, after all. Nothing in there to do any sullying!” 

“Humans do like their fluids,” Sandalphon agrees sagely. He doesn’t drink any water. 

Gabriel picks up an assignment in Lambeth, then heads north afterwards. Instead of his usual post-blessing run, he goes looking for Crowley. He changes into more casual attire first—his smoke-coloured turtleneck and jeans and, on a whim, a casual cotton blazer in the soft grey of a swan egg that he spots in the window of a store en route. He should have guessed Crowley would see him as a threat the first time around, but now Gabriel looks like he’s on the same page as Crowley, at least when it comes to clothes. He hopes. He musses up his hair a bit, in case that helps.

It doesn’t take more than a minor miracle to find Crowley again, this time on Marchmont Street, standing near a bookshop and talking to someone on the phone. Gabriel’s efforts to match him are in vain, as today he is wearing a long black wrap dress in some floaty-looking fabric, with the flicks of a fringe peeking out in between his dark glasses and a wine-red sun hat. Gabriel crosses to the same side of the street and approaches less obtrusively this time, watching the lipsticked curve of Crowley’s mouth moving rapidly. 

“...you too, angel,” he’s saying, as Gabriel comes within earshot. “I’ll see you later, yeah? Want me to bring—oh hang on, one sec—”

He swivels his head to look directly at Gabriel, who manages to get out, “Crowley! Buddy. Just want to talk—” as the demon snaps his fingers again. And then there is a horrible discordant noise as the piano Gabriel had somehow miraculously been standing directly underneath meets the pavement, crushing Gabriel’s new body—and the new blazer!—beneath it. Gabriel hears Crowley return to his conversation with a breezy, “Sorry about that, angel, piano movers, you know how it is…” before he is jolted back to Heaven again with a frustrated sigh.

Michael gives him a reproving look when he re-enters her office with an apologetic grin. There aren’t any more of his spares on hand—she suggests to him the option of a different corporation, but Gabriel feels oddly attached to his current look so he’s willing to wait out the nine months it will take to generate a new one, even fast-tracked. He completes the paperwork, gets about his business.

Adjusting is stranger, this time around. When Gabriel re-enters his physical frame, he is beset by an unpleasant tingling sensation across every inch of his skin, and moving is distant and sluggish to him for a full hour before his limbs stop feeling like leaden weights and start to feel familiar again. He goes for a run before his assignment this time, reminding himself what it feels like, regaining his balance. He makes a delivery of hope to St Thomas’ Hospital, and leans a little on a few consciences in Westminster for good measure, since he’s in the area. He sits on a bench outside of the Abbey for a while, considering his next move. 

When he goes to find Crowley again, Gabriel is no longer complacent. He is fully girded with a business suit and every divine protection afforded an archangel, and while the humans of Leicester Square can’t perceive it, most have some level of subconscious instinct for the presence of overwhelming spiritual power and give him a wide berth without quite knowing why. Crowley, back in a slim black jacket accented with red piping and hair slightly longer than it was last time, notices instantly and bolts for a nearby alleyway, snapping his fingers as he goes. Gabriel barely even feels the dings as whatever miracles Crowley is attempting are instantly nullified by the power that surrounds him. He charges after Crowley and, as the demon turns to engage, Gabriel grabs his arms. His hands dig tightly into Gabriel’s sleeves in return, and he snarls.

What follows would appear to any observing human—had they not all decided they suddenly had important things to do that were not in Leicester Square—to be somewhat of an ineffectual grappling match between two tall, thoroughly pissed off men. This is because at this stage, the ensuing conflict is far more metaphysical than physical, and entirely beyond human comprehension. Still, were a human capable of perceiving it, they may describe it as something like the following:

Over the sands of the spiritual plane hovers Gabriel, armoured in righteousness and robed in justice, his androgynous, ageless form borne aloft on multiple overlapping pairs of wide golden wings, a holy sword of brilliant light in his right hand. Before him his opponent, winged but cursed to crawl, coils upon the ground and rears his head in the manner of a great snake, hissing and spitting with fury, lashing out with fangs of wrath and bitterness. Gabriel guards against his attacks but finds himself more well-matched than he’d expected. He is holding back, having no desire to actually destroy Crowley, nor any desire to help him test whether his new-found immunity to holy water extends to holy blades. Crowley, on the other hand, is exceptionally powerful in those few occasions when he is determined to be, and his assault upon Gabriel is focussed, unrelenting, and intensely personal. It puts Gabriel in mind of one time in Persia, long ago, and he cannot afford to be waylaid for twenty-one days again (it was embarrassing enough the first time), so he throws himself into the combat, wrestling bodily with the serpent until his foot is upon his throat and his sword held against the red and black scales. Crowley stills and glares up at him through yellow eyes.

“Right,” Gabriel says briskly. “Now that I have your attention: I’m not here to kill you. Nor Aziraphale, for that matter, if that’s bothering you. I literally just want to have a conversation. So enough with the discorporations. Okay?”

Crowley’s eyes narrow at him sceptically.

“Well, you didn’t give me a chance to say anything the first couple of times, did you? Hm?” Gabriel replies. “Now, I’m going to back down, and maybe we can be reasonable about this.”

He sheathes his sword, and his whole self and consciousness follows, his focus re-emerging into the physical world where the two of them still grip each others’ arms. He lets go and straightens his suit jacket while Crowley pulls back with a hiss. The demon moves fast and Gabriel doesn’t see the pocketknife until Crowley grips his throat and runs the blade across it. Gabriel chokes and sputters over the spray of blood and searing pain, and his body’s knees give way as it slips past the point of any miraculous healing that would be worth the effort. As his eyes go dark, he sees the silhouette of Crowley leaning over him.

“Nah. Don’t think I’m inclined to be reasonable right now. Not interested in talking to you. Don’t come back.”

The last of Gabriel’s self-control gives up the ghost before he does. “Oh _fuck_ you, Crowley,” he spits, and discorporates again. 

Gabriel attracts more than a few stares from other angels on his return to Heaven. The focus of angelic combat has changed his manifestation to something more like his underlying metaphysical appearance, wings and robes no longer fitting inside a human-shaped projection, body pellucid yet deep in colour like rough-cut ametrine. It’s not that uncommon for this to happen—those angels stationed in space or otherwise far from humanity will often return in far more alien forms when dropping by the Earth office from their stint in Deep Heaven. Angels usually only return from Earth itself in such a state when they’ve been engaged in direct spiritual warfare. It unnerves and agitates the Host around him—what does it mean? Are the End Times back on? He smiles and tells them that there’s nothing to worry about, because really, there isn’t. It’s just some weird personal thing he’s doing, and it is.

He can’t return to Heaven like this again, he resolves. It would be careless. 

Michael gives him a level stare for a good long while when he re-enters her office, sitting down cross-legged on the floor because it feels more natural, right now, than taking a seat on a chair at her desk. The very concept of chairs seems a little distant and strange at the moment.

“You know what this reminds me of?” she says, voice light and conversational. “That time with Daniel. Do you remember?”

“It would be hard not to,” Gabriel concedes.

Michael gives a fond chuckle. “I had to come bail you out. Who knows how long that kid would have had to wait for his answer while you were tied up wrestling—now, who was it again?” 

“Not important. Anyway, I totally had things under control,” Gabriel grumbles good-naturedly. It’s an argument they like to have every few decades, and it usually ends with Gabriel laughing and Michael smiling.

“Do you have things under control now, Gabriel?” Michael’s eyebrows rise, and her gaze is piercing. She knows he’s been fighting a demon, and spending a lot of effort doing so—there’s really no other good explanation for his state. But Gabriel doesn’t want to admit to it. If he does, Michael will ask why he lost. Why he keeps losing. 

“I’ve just had a run of bad luck,” Gabriel says with a shrug. 

“There is no such thing as bad luck. We’re _angels_.”

Gabriel shrugs again. Michael sighs, soft and a little sad. She slides a tablet across her desk and Gabriel gets up to examine it. It displays a statistics page—Gabriel’s own statistics page—a plot of miracle usage over time featured on its screen. He notes the spike in the most recent data with a wince.

“You know you can ask me for help, Gabriel. Don’t you?” Michael’s voice is little more than a whisper. “I know I tease you about it. But if this happens again, I can come and back you up. You know that, don’t you?” She looks up at his face, like she’s searching for something. This isn’t how the argument is supposed to go. It’s distressing. Gabriel tries not to let it show.

“I know,” he replies with a smile. 

Michael gives a brittle twitch of her lips in response. Whatever she’s looking for, it seems she doesn’t see it.

“I’m afraid I can’t fast-track new bodies for you any more, Gabriel.”

Gabriel keeps smiling. “I understand.” 

It’s two years before he’s cleared to recorporate. His regular assignments have been diverted elsewhere in the meantime. It’s long enough that he finds himself missing Earth, now, to a degree that he hasn’t before. He wonders if he’s become attached to it, like Aziraphale. Well, perhaps not as bad a case as that, but still, he misses just _being_, in a physical sense. The loss of sensation isn’t just an absence, it’s a numbness. When he finally sees his body again, he is overwhelmed with relief and rushes to join it. He enters, and—

—it’s too small and why is the spine _like that_ and what’s with _lungs_ and why won’t his wings _fit_ and—

—he jolts back out with a deep shudder and stares at the body in horror. Did it just _reject_ him? His emotional distress somehow feels worse without a body, without the pulse and trembling and brain chemistry swirling in sympathy. Just a pure dark pit of dread.

“You’re just out of practice,” says Sandalphon at his side, unworried and reassuring. “Especially since you’re not you-shaped at the moment. Remember orientation. Did you ever do orientation again after the first time?”

“No,” Gabriel admits. “I never needed to.”

“I go every five hundred years, whether I need to or not,” Sandalphon says proudly.

Gabriel beams at him. “See, this is why I can count on you. C’mon, talk me through it again.”

Sandalphon recites and Gabriel follows the meditative drone of his voice. Close your eyes, turn inwards, wrap yourself up small, and imagine what it is to dwell within yourself. Turn within, and within again, find the edges of yourself and draw them together. Now take your self, newly condensed, and imagine that you are walking into a house built just for you, a perfect temple for your spirit. Enter it like a cloud, and once you’re inside, release yourself. Fill the space, inhabit every corner and every crack until you are not just surrounded, you are _become_. 

When Gabriel opens his eyes, they are the lilac eyes of his corporation again. Light sears into his skull at the same time that he becomes aware of the roar of his body’s workings in his ears, and every inch of him _feels_, and it’s too much all at once. It hurts. Through the bombardment and overstimulation he tries to remain upright but he can’t remember how to fast enough. He falls over immediately. 

Gabriel writhes on the floor for a few moments, while he adjusts to the stream of feedback from his body and rebuilds his sense of proprioception from the ground up. Sandalphon looks down at him patiently until he’s collected enough to sit upright again. 

“Well, that was unpleasant. Do human babies have to go through that every time they’re born?” 

“I believe they do spend their first moments crying about it,” Sandalphon replies.

“I don’t blame them,” Gabriel mutters.

It takes another day to adjust before Gabriel is used to feeling again. After that, he takes a few personal days on Earth to re-orient himself. He goes running, runs and runs and runs, until every part of his frame is back under his control, until the movements are as natural to him as they always were, until the pump of blood and pull of muscle are no longer tsunami and wildfire. He drinks water, then goes from café to café, trying as many green teas as he can find, until his senses of smell and taste no longer threaten to suffocate him, until the surrounding noise of human conversation is no longer a cacophony of thunder. 

It’s nice, he realises, to get back to basics and relearn embodiment again, remind himself how to enjoy his physicality. He almost decides to stop searching for Crowley—he just wants some time in the world again, after being away for so long in a shape that’s become unfamiliar to him. But he hasn’t been able to stop thinking. It’s been two years of mulling and stewing in his thoughts and refusing to make eye contact with Michael. He’d thought that the whirlwind of recorporation would have served as a distraction, but it hasn’t. He can’t even fully enjoy his green tea tour—he’s discovered something called genmaicha, and drinking it makes him feel like an expansive field of rice, warm and green and fragrant—only rice fields don’t have existential crises, do they?

He needs to talk to Crowley, and he needs to figure out how. He can’t keep putting it off. And he needs to do it without miracles this time. Michael will be keeping a close eye on his usage, and she won’t hesitate to come to his aid if it looks like he needs it. He considers opening up to her, but shuts that thought down immediately. The inside of his head is filled with poison. He won’t infect any other angel with it, and certainly not Michael. 

Finding Crowley without a miracle takes longer than Gabriel would like, but he manages eventually. It’s night time, outside some club near Piccadilly Circus, when he spots a familiar figure in black staring down at a phone and tucking strands of shoulder-length red hair behind his ear. He takes a moment to check that it really is Crowley—the demon is now in leggings and an artfully tattered skirt (well, Gabriel assumes that it’s meant to look like that), with a cropped leather jacket over a black tank top this time, but it’s unmistakably him. Where does he find all these clothes? Has he not found a look that he likes yet? Or does he somehow like all of them? 

Keeping his ambient divinity to a minimum, no higher than the average human’s, Gabriel approaches Crowley and reaches out to tap him on the shoulder. Surprised, Crowley lashes out with one hand, smacking Gabriel in his right eyesocket. Normally he’d brush off such violent contact with little more than a thought, but without a miracle the force of the blow sends pain rippling across his face. He recoils, a hand coming up to cradle his eye before he can even consciously react.

Crowley stares, surprise creasing his features for a second, before he follows up the blow with a kick to the crotch. Pain reverberates through Gabriel like a struck bell, and he doubles over, only to receive a vicious knee to his nose. He staggers backwards. He’s never let physical pain stick around long enough to bother him before. It lingers, echoing and resounding through his face, through his core. 

“Owww,” he says, and means it.

The image of Crowley is wobbly in front of him as he blinks furiously to try and clear his vision, but his facial expression is clear enough. The demon is gaping at him, and Gabriel takes the opportunity to straighten up again.

“You’re not using any miracles, are you?” Crowley murmurs, a strange sort of smile dancing on the edge of his lips. “Worried about a strongly-worded note from Heaven?”

Gabriel thinks for a moment that he’ll stop, but Crowley moves to throw another punch. Gabriel’s more prepared this time—he has plenty of martial training to fall back on, and even unenhanced by miraculous strength, his body is tall and tough and not easily broken. He blocks the first couple of Crowley’s blows easily enough, but Crowley’s not interested in a fair fight. He has miracles on his side and is more than willing to use them—well, Hell could hardly object to such a use of demonic power—and the force of his fists drive Gabriel back into a nearby alleyway. 

Gabriel raises his arms and fends off the blows as best he can, though his disadvantage is more profound than he first realised. Only a few days ago, his physical senses had overwhelmed him at their return. Now with those senses to hand and no others, in the dark and wilfully blind to the more expansive angelic awareness of soul and spirit to which he is accustomed, it’s as if he fights in a fog.

Crowley snaps his fingers and Gabriel hears a clanging noise behind him. He doesn’t work out what it is until he is pushed another step backwards and his stomach leaps inside him as he plunges through suddenly open trapdoors to the concrete floor of a cellar. He rolls as he lands but still feels a shockwave lance through his torso as one of his ribs fractures. And then things happen very fast.

There’s a finger-snap—Crowley is in the cellar with him as he hauls himself to his feet—another snap—a stack of metal barrels filled with some vile-smelling liquid unbalances and topples towards him—he staggers backwards, barely avoids their weight thundering down—a steely screeching noise—Crowley strides towards him wielding a length of narrow pipe he’s torn from the wall—the long ragged stump left behind sticks out at right angles from the brickwork—Crowley swings at his head and the world briefly turns to a flash of white light and another hammer-strike of pain—the next blow hits his arm as he flings it up over his face—he surges forward and grasps out for the makeshift weapon—Lord, he can’t see a thing—finds it, clutches it in one hand, tries to wrench it from Crowley—they both pull, pull, momentum spinning them in a half-circle—Crowley lets go—Gabriel staggers backwards, pipe flung from his fingers, then—

A sharp, wet agony punctures his chest and it takes all he has to grit his teeth and stop his body from screaming aloud. Alarm rings through every part of his nervous system. Through sheer force of will he forbids his bladder to empty in panic, but he can’t stop the rest of it—the drench of sweat down his face, through his clothes, along his hair—the hot liquid overflow from his eyes running down over his cheeks, his lips, his chin—the throbbing surge of blood spilling in thick pulses from where the torn metal stump of piping emerges from the middle of his chest, soaking into the grey of his clothes. 

He fights with the compulsion to discorporate then and there, rejects the instinct to miracle himself out of the situation, and feels his body and spirit come to a hideous compromise—everything shifts about an inch out of synch, and Gabriel momentarily finds himself a dispassionate observer of his own body’s pain. It feels wrong, monstrous even, to leave it—himself—hanging there in all the indignity of torment and anguish, but he notices that Crowley’s stopped fighting now and is pacing instead, agitated, round and around the cramped and ransacked cellar. No, not yet. If the Almighty deigned to suffer like this once, in weak and frail human form, then Gabriel can suffer it too. He can hold on a little longer. 

Crowley scrubs a jacket sleeve across his brow, then stiffens up as he notices the angel staring dully at him. He grimaces, his entire face contorting around bared teeth, and hisses. 

“Sssstill here, Gabriel?” 

Gabriel sucks in a breath to respond and the action pulls him back into his body. He closes his mouth and winces from the renewed onslaught of pain it causes. It hits him like a tidal wave, threatening to push him back out entirely, and he braces himself against it.

Crowley scoffs, the sound high and strained. “You want to talk? Fine! You have until this body dies.” 

“I… have questions,” Gabriel manages to cough out. And there it is. The relief at finally saying it out loud is almost worth the pain it took to get here. Crowley doesn’t answer at first, but his eyes seem to widen slightly behind his glasses. Gabriel shudders in another breath. “I have… doubts. Don’t un’stand the Plan any more. Can’t talk with Upstairs ‘bout it. Or Downstairs. God forbid. Not… not ‘Ziraphale. So.”

“So, what, me? You thought we could just—just sit down and have a _drink_ about it or something?” Crowley nearly shrieks.

“This is—all this—” Gabriel attempts to gesture down at himself and almost blacks out doing so. He tries again. “This is about what we did. To Aziraphale. Isn’t it? ‘M not stupid. Know—know vengeance when I see it.”

Crowley snarls and grips his collar, and the tug of his torso against the impaling piece of pipe sends fresh waves of pain into his chest. “I could burn you away while I have you here. Succeed where you failed.” The thought is alarming enough that Gabriel briefly considers miracling himself out right now, but Crowley is unlikely to have immediate access to Hellfire. He banks on it being an empty threat.

“It was wrong. I was wrong. Wasn’t a good thing. Know that. Shouldn’t have done it. Shouldn’t have done—that—to ‘Ziraphale. I’m not wrong, never wrong, not ‘bout anything. But that. That was. Wrong.”

Crowley takes a step backwards, releasing his grip and pulling his hands back in towards himself. He’s grimacing again, as if repulsed by what he’s seeing. 

“And that’s the problem. Isn’t it?” Gabriel continues. Confession is spilling freely from his mouth now, and he couldn’t stop it even if he wanted to. “I wouldn’t make a m’stake. _Can’t_ make a m’stake. ’m an _angel_. We can’t _be_ wrong. How could we? How would we _know_? If we made a m’stake and didn’t Fall for it?”

Crowley’s eyebrows bunch together and his mouth drops open a little, making little aborted sounds that don’t quite make it to being words.

“We didn’t _Fall_. How do we fix things we don’t know’re broken? Even if they are?” Gabriel’s talking faster now, faster and more desperately as he sees himself hurtle towards the logical conclusion he’s been too scared to approach, too madly and fundamentally terrified of acknowledging all this time, and he wants to stop, he wants to disappear back to Heaven and hug Michael and pretend none of this happened but it’s too late, he won’t be silenced now, not unless God Herself intervenes. “What if we missed the signs all along? What if we’re just in denial? Both sides, Heav’n an’ Hell, working from the same playbook all this time. Haven’t heard the voice of God in so long. So long. Just the Metatron. Bus’ness as usual. Maybe he’s as deluded as the rest of us, maybe—”

“Why are you here?” Crowley interrupts, frenzied, fingers bunched in his hair. “I don’t get it, why aren’t you miracling yourself free? What the _fuck_ are you talking about?”

“Wanted… to meet you halfway,” Gabriel gasps back. “Knew what that might mean. This. Punishment. Maybe… maybe it helps. Maybe some way to repay, redeem, penance…”

Crowley grabs his face, fingers sinking viciously into his cheeks, and the edges of his vision go fuzzy. “No!” Crowley spits, almost nose to nose with Gabriel. “No, this isn’t how this worksss!”

“Isn’t it?” Gabriel struggles to hang on to the thread of the conversation. He’s tired. He’s so tired. “Isn’t this… vengeance for harming your… friend? You’re a demon, ‘s what you do. Violence, torture. Aren’t you… enjoying this?”

“NO!” Crowley yells, voice cracking in distress. “That’s it. That’s enough.” 

He reaches into his jacket and pulls out the knife. For the second time, he cuts Gabriel’s throat, and all mortal pain sloughs away as Gabriel slips the surly bonds of Earth and reaches out—for what, he knows not.

Souls that have undergone profound pain before their deaths will often arrive in Heaven bearing scars. Tears and suffering are washed away but memory is not erased, and sometimes it leaves imprints of the things they survived—or the things they did not. This is when Gabriel discovers that the same can apply to angels, should they be careless enough to allow it to happen to them. He arrives back in Heaven with a hole through his chest and a line across his throat. He gets more worried looks from the angels around him, but the truth is, the wounds are no longer gruesome things; they glow slightly from within, and the reminder they serve of physical trauma is more abstract than painful. That’s not what hurts him.

Nothing in Heaven is changed since he left it, and yet everything is. It’s like he’s opened his eyes for the first time, and what he sees is so alien to him that he cannot believe he’s not noticed before. Heaven is wide and open—and sparse, and disconnected. Its light and purity is cold and detached. Its beauty is empty, its silence is not tranquility but an absence of song and joy. If he thinks—if he really _thinks_, takes his mind back far enough, he can remember the all-encompassing sound of praise and wonder, and the peace that came from the drowning out of all else, when the very air was as heavy and heady as incense and as fresh as a mountain breeze, saturated with love and awe and the Presence. And now it’s gone, and he hadn’t even _noticed_. Why is it so hard to remember? What the Hell happened?

He sits across from Michael again and this time he can’t fake a smile. He sees her sat at her desk with newfound clarity—she seems tired and burdened and somehow small, not physically but in spirit. She could have filled up her entire office and beyond with her presence, her fierceness and zeal, her love—and now it seems all tightly bound up behind her face, which still smiles at him, even now. 

“Won’t you tell me what happened, Gabriel?” she asks him again, almost pleading. “Please, can’t you tell me what’s wrong?”

“I can’t,” he replies, and it breaks his heart.

“You’ve become so distant. Like Aziraphale. I don’t want to lose you too.” She is smiling, and she is also weeping. Gabriel is overwhelmed with grief. He feels as if he has lost her already. Sorrow bubbles up within him, but he has no physical eyes with which to let it flow out. 

“I can’t. I’m sorry.” 

“Why not?” Michael’s smile wavers and trembles. “Gabriel,” she entreats him, voice quiet and pained. “Do you think I wouldn’t _understand?_”

Simple and agonising, he feels the truth sink into him like claws. “I think you would,” he tells her, suddenly knowing she already does. “But I’m not ready yet.”

Michael nods, and hands him his paperwork, smile still pinned to her features like a dead butterfly. 

It takes five years. Even after a new body is ready, Gabriel takes his time. He takes a long walk out into the asteroid belt and watches the angels that govern gravity tell the rocks to spin and dance, ceaseless in their devotion. He goes to orientation again, starts right from the basics—it covers far more ground than it did the first time around, and he learns more about humans than he thought he would. Sandalphon takes it with him and provides a running commentary of six thousand years of updates which he appreciates deeply. And, finally, he re-enters his body, whole and intact once more, and returns to Earth. He stands in a park and watches ducks for a while, thinking about what to do next. He should go back to Heaven, he thinks. He doesn’t want to burden Michael, but she has offered to help him carry it. Maybe it’s time.

This time, Crowley finds him. Gabriel looks up to see him and Aziraphale standing nearby, hand in hand. Neither look particularly happy to be there, but neither do they look surprised—evidently they sensed his arrival and came to seek him out themselves. He wants to greet them but holds himself back, waiting for them to make the first move. 

Aziraphale looks at Crowley. “Are you sure you’ll be all right?” he asks.

Crowley grimaces and nods. “Yeah. ‘Sfine.” 

“Well, you know where to find me if you need me.” Aziraphale squeezes his hand and leans in to kiss his cheek. Then he turns and gives a stiff nod to his former boss. “Gabriel.” And leaves.

Gabriel watches Crowley watch him, and neither say a word for a minute. Then Crowley sniffs and gestures with his head over one shoulder. “Come on.” He walks off in a saunter and Gabriel follows him. 

“D’you drink?” Crowley asks. 

“Yes!” Gabriel replies brightly, relieved that Crowley is finally amenable to start a conversation. “I drink water. And green tea.”

Crowley scoffs. “Oh, _Heaven_ no. We’re having something much, _much_ stronger than that.” 

“Okay.” Gabriel feels no small amount of trepidation at that, but mainly he’s just happy they’re not fighting. He follows Crowley to a nearby bar, where Crowley hisses, “A bottle,” at a serving human who apparently knows exactly what he means by that, because they immediately hand him a copper-coloured liquid and two glasses, which he takes over to a booth. He gestures for Gabriel to sit. 

“I like your clothes,” Gabriel tells him as he wrenches at the bottle top and pours two servings of what the bottle says is whisky. He’s back in a slim black jacket and skinny jeans, albeit with a slightly different cut and ornamentation than what Gabriel saw last. Crowley stares at Gabriel for a moment at the comment, then makes a non-commital grunt and continues pouring. 

“I like all of them. You change them a lot. They’re not real like Aziraphale’s, right?”

Crowley snorts. “We have different preferences, Gabriel. Like this.” He flicks one of the glasses with a finger, making it chime and causing the liquid inside to shimmer.

“Drink,” he says. 

Gabriel picks up one of the glasses and sniffs it experimentally. The fumes assault the inside of his nose as if trying to stab his brain through his mucous membrane, and he looks back up at Crowley in dismay. “You can’t be serious?”

Crowley stares at him through his sunglasses, bringing his own glass up to his mouth and taking a large gulp without breaking eye contact. He swallows it and expels a noisy breath which turns into an expectant hiss. Gabriel sighs and rolls his eyes, but he takes a sip anyway. 

The whisky burns the inside of his mouth and somehow steals away his breath, and he swallows hastily before giving an incredibly undignified, spluttering cough as he struggles to get his lungs to behave themselves. “Really?!” he wheezes. Crowley nods gravely. The whisky hurts, and Gabriel hates it, but he takes another sip anyway. 

“This is miserable,” he complains. Crowley just gulps down another mouthful and scowls at him. Gabriel scowls back. “_You’re_ miserable.” 

Crowley wrinkles his nose at that. “Don’t know what you expected. We didn’t exactly part on the best of terms.”

“About that,” Gabriel says with a frown. “I still don’t understand why you stopped it short. I thought demons were meant to enjoy that sort of thing—violence, impaling, torture, you know.”

“Pffft. Don’t give demons all the credit. The worst we can do we learned from humans themselves. They still do seminars on the Spanish Inquisition in Hell. I…” He waves his glass around aimlessly then downs the remnants, slams it back on the table and reaches for the bottle to refill it with a tight expression on his face. “You got off lightly. Personal torture’s not really my style. Could’ve done a lot worse to you if I were in the mood.”

“But you weren’t?” Gabriel prompts.

Crowley groans. “Not just—look, that’s not who I am. There’s the sort of person who enjoys killing and torture, and I’m not that person. I was pretty sure I wanted you dead for what you tried to pull with Aziraphale, but I realised I didn’t like—I don’t, look, usually I’m…”

“You’re a demon,” Gabriel insists. He draws in his brows, trying to figure out the point Crowley’s making. It’s not like he knows Crowley well, but it’s been nothing but killing and torture since they’ve met, and there’s no reason for that to be surprising. 

“I’m better than that,” Crowley spits out. “I’m a better person than that. I want to be. A better person than that.”

Understanding dawns upon him, and Gabriel nods. “Then I forgive you,” he says. 

Crowley slams his fists down on the table in rage. “NOT YOU TOO!” Gabriel is not sure who he’s referring to, but sits patiently through Crowley’s indignant sputtering until it forms itself into intelligible language once more. It is true—the mistreatment of his body at Crowley’s hands wasn’t exactly pleasant, but to a certain extent it was understandable, given his nature. Gabriel would find it hard to hold it against him. And since he’s already forgiven Aziraphale for his part in the whole Not-Ending-The-Times thing, there’s no reason not to forgive Crowley too.

“What the _fuck_. Why would you even—why would _anyone_—what—_fuck_ you.”

Gabriel sighs and explains it to him. “Because when you are forgiven, you are given the opportunity to be a better person next time, and that state of being a better person will matter more than what you did before.” Crowley glares at him balefully and unappreciatively, so Gabriel adds, “I’d like that opportunity as well.”

“I _know_ what forgiveness is, Gab—hang on.” Crowley blinks, and gives a sharp bark of laughter. “You’re asking _me_ to forgive _you?!_”

“Well, you were angry with me. I mean, if you must know, Aziraphale and I have already forgiven each other so I don’t really need—”

“Oh trust me, you still need mine,” Crowley interrupts with a snarl. Gabriel isn’t entirely sure what he’s ever done to Crowley, but he’s prepared to take the demon at his word if it will help matters.

“In which case, I would like it. If you’re capable of it—and of course, I wouldn’t hold it against you if you weren’t—”

“SHUT UP! I forgive you.”

Gabriel blinks in surprise.

“For being a complete arsehole and a colossal idiot. I forgive you. Okay?” Crowley growls. “Now be a better person.”

Gabriel swallows at Crowley’s frank assessment of his character. “I’ll try.”

“Good.”

Crowley falls silent and stares at his drink. Gabriel takes another sip of his own, for something to do. The drink had felt like a punishment, at first, perhaps a way for Crowley to continue to torture him without actively killing his corporeal form, but now it just feels warm and tingly. The pain has receded enough for him to start to taste it. It’s like a lump of burning wood on his tongue. It makes him want to tell the truth.

“Aziraphale said he’d told you about what happened, what we tried to do in Heaven.”

Crowley snorts at that, as if he finds something funny, but he lets Gabriel talk.

“We thought… I thought… given everything that had gone wrong, if we just removed the defective element, if… if it was all his fault and so we got rid of him, it would all be over, we could just… I don’t know. Things would go back to how they were supposed to be. Trying to do the scapegoat thing, I guess.”

“Tsch. Don’t you know your own stories? That’s not how the scapegoat works. I _told_ you that’s not how this works. Was I the only one who spent any amount of time with the ancient Israelites?” It’s Gabriel’s turn to be speechless at that. “You put all the sins on its head, you make it all its fault. But you don’t kill it. You let it go free afterwards. Release it into the wild. It wanders off and takes all the bad stuff with it. ‘Course, it probably does end up dying, in the end, ‘cause the world is cruel, ‘cause things kill each other. But it’s not supposed to be you. You just let it take the sin away, and poof! God forgives you.” He pings the glass again with one finger and gives a bitter chuckle. “Not that God’s really in the habit of forgiving angels.”

There’s a long quiet as Gabriel mulls that over. It turns around in his mind, slowly and thickly, like syrup. “I don’t know if God has forgiven us,” he says eventually. “We thought that if we got rid of the thing responsible for messing up the Plan—the two of you—that would fix things. But it didn’t work. And if it didn’t work, maybe you were right about the Ineffable Plan. But… for demons to go against a divine Plan, or at least to try to, that’s one thing, but angels? We’re instruments of the Almighty’s holy will, we shouldn’t be _able_ to go against the Plan.”

“And yet, here you are.”

“But then, how long did we think we were following the Plan, but got it wrong? How much do we need forgiveness for, how do we tell? If there’s no punishment, no Falling? Look, I’m asking questions and not Falling, how is that right?”

“You’re asking me,” Crowley mutters, curling a lip in bewilderment. “That’s just not fair.”

“At least if I Fell I’d _know_, you know?” Gabriel complains. It’s odd, he ought to feel terrible about this, but it feels strangely good to finally let it all out. He’s been so scared all this time about acknowledging it, about what that would do to him, or to any other angel he infected with his doubts. But now he feels entirely uninhibited—there’s no consequence at all, he can rant as much as he likes. God’s just not listening. Or maybe She just stopped caring long ago. Or maybe it’s already too late. Was it possible to Fall without noticing? Could that have somehow happened to him? To the entirety of Heaven? “Or, maybe I just wouldn’t,” he murmurs. 

Crowley drums his fingers on his upturned chin, contemplating something. “You managed to figure out you’d done something wrong, eventually,” he says. He’s a lot calmer now, verging on thoughtful. “D’you have a conscience in there somewhere?” He wrinkles his nose. “Must do, you at least have some concept of having made a mistake. Maybe that’s some sense of the Plan? Voice of God? I dunno, I can’t remember what it sounds like. If I remembered it might kill me. Hah!” He laughs, as if what he says is not fundamentally horrifying.

“No, that’s not it,” Gabriel says quickly. He’d recognise it if it were. He hasn’t heard the voice of God in thousands of years. Maybe that should have been the first sign that something was wrong, surely someone would have noticed—but then, he hadn’t. “After all, you thought stopping Armageddon was the right thing to do, so you must have something like a conscience as well, unless—” He thinks of Crowley's bitter laugh and an entirely more horrifying thought occurs to him. “God didn’t talk to _you_, did She?”

“NO!” Crowley objects, like it’s the most ridiculous thing he ever heard. “That’s _absurd_.”

“Right. Well. That’s okay then.”

They stare at each other for a moment, and then Crowley laughs—genuinely laughs this time, throwing back his head in a loud guffaw. Gabriel joins him in something like relief. He’s right, it is absurd. And the whole situation is absurd. The only thing he can do now is laugh.

“Oh, can you imagine,” Crowley says with a sigh, face still stretched into a grin. He swirls his whisky around in his glass, downs the remainder in a gulp and a satisfied exhale. “Funny though. Never stopped talking to Her. Didn’t ever kick the habit.”

Gabriel shrugs. “Guess there’s nothing stopping you. Nothing wrong with doing that.” There’s about a finger’s depth left in his glass. Just for the hell of it, he imitates Crowley, tosses his head back and downs it in a single gulp. It still burns on the way down, but it’s comfortable burn, warm and fuzzy. Like Aziraphale looked, standing in Hellfire, comfortable as anything. It’s ridiculous. Gabriel giggles. “Y’know, it’s been nice talking to you. You’re all right, for a demon.”

“Uh. Thanks, I s’pose?” Crowley says. “You know, maybe that’s enough whisky for one day.” He vanishes the bottle and Gabriel belatedly grabs after it, scowls, then giggles at his weirdly slow reaction time. “Yeeeaaaaah, also you should sober up before your body does so by itself. Hangovers are pretty rubbish. Not that you’ve had that much, but if it’s your first time, better not risk it.”

Gabriel continues to giggle—he can’t help it, Crowley is really funny for some reason. A demon who doesn’t want to be a demon and talks to God, even though God’s not listening, not even to the angels. It’s hilarious, really. He sees why Aziraphale likes him.

“You know, you fight really well,” he tells him. “Really gave me a run for my money in spiritual battle—I mean, I wasn’t trying to kill you, but still. And the bus? The piano? That was smart. And funny! You’re extremely good at what you do.”

Crowley makes a strangled noise at him. “What?” he manages to croak out.

“Yeah, I know, demon, enemy, but I do appreciate a job well done. Y’know, from a boss’ perspective, you get me? I see why Aziraphale was always talking about how wily you are. Pretty wily!” He gives Crowley finger-guns, and hits one hand on the edge of the table in the process, but he reckons he successfully communicates the spirit of the gesture.

Crowley continues to make sputtering noises. 

“Anyway, nice chat. Got stuff to do so I’ll be on my way.” Gabriel reaches across the table to clap Crowley on the shoulder, and the demon squeaks at him. “Aziraphale could do a lot worse.”

It takes him two tries, but he successfully gets to his feet and makes it to the bar, where he brandishes his heavenly credit card at the bartender. “Bottle,” he explains, and the human seems to understand perfectly, taking his card to the cash register in a dazzling display of competence for such a pathetically short life. 

“You,” he tells the human when they return the card, “are doing a _great_ job.”

He leaves the bar just as Crowley regains his voice from wherever he lost it. “COULD DO A LOT WORSE?!”

Gabriel changes his clothes, grateful for the fact that his nice soft grey tracksuit was the one outfit he owned that had come out unscathed from his conflict with Crowley, and returns to the park for a run. He finds that the alcohol is adversely affecting his balance to an unacceptable degree, so he takes Crowley’s advice and sobers up. It is not pleasant. His mouth now feels dry and sticky, and he hadn’t noticed how warm and fuzzy the world had become until it stopped being so. He thinks back on his conversation with growing alarm at what he’d said—but then, nothing had come to smite him. Not then, and not now.

Gabriel feels a strange sense of peace as he falls back into the meditative rhythm of running. It’s a peace borne out of devastation—his understanding of the world lies in pieces around him like ruins, but he’s not dead. It’s the peace of having already hit the bottom somewhere along the way, with nowhere left to fall. But he’s still here. Somehow, he survived. Despite everything, he is able to laugh.

He returns to Heaven by the front entrance, with a serenity he hasn’t felt for nearly a decade. The angels he passes give a quiet sigh of relief, that whatever Gabriel’s been going through is finally over. Gabriel grants them their moment of peace—it may be taken from them soon enough, and he won’t be so cruel as to hasten it. He taps on the door of Michael’s office. She looks up, and she looks tired and harried. He almost decides not to add to her troubles, but as she sees that it’s him, her eyes light up a little with love and hope. 

“Michael?” he says with a gentle smile. “I… I’ve been thinking.”

**Author's Note:**

> This fic refers to the events of the book of Daniel, chapter 10, in which Gabriel delivers a prophetic message in answer to Daniel’s prayer, but is held up for twenty-one days by a demon in Persia and has to have Michael come help him out. Particularly in the context of Good Omens!verse, this is incredibly entertaining.
> 
> The whole deal with the scapegoat comes from Leviticus 16. I’m not sure the theological distinction between the goat that is sacrificed and the scapegoat is well understood, and certainly not by me, but it is true that the scapegoat is left to wander into the wilderness alive.
> 
> I slightly adapt a line or two from the poem High Flight by John Gillespie Magee Jr (“I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth…”) because apparently I live to traumatise myself.
> 
> Also, I feel obliged to acknowledge the fast day of Tisha B'Av in the Jewish calendar, which was this past weekend, and hope it isn't too tastelessly soon to post a fic with this title. (The timing wasn’t deliberate, but it has been on my mind while writing this, and the title is a deliberate nod. Woops.)
> 
> Say hi to me on tumblr [@trisshawkeye](https://trisshawkeye.tumblr.com/)!


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